The Best Laid Plans (36 page)

My efforts are met with the sounds of silence. “Again!” I say even more forcefully. “One, two, three …”

“I’m sorry,” Sienna says, so softly that I practically have to read her lips to be sure of her words.

“I’m sorry,” Bill tells his shoes.

“Geez, you guys!” Molly says.

“Bill,” I say, planting myself nose-to-nose with my ex-partner. “Sienna loves you, she wants you, she needs you. And I know that you want her, too. She’s strong-willed and passionate; I know that can make her hard to live with. But that’s probably what makes her hard to live without, too.”

Sienna takes a step closer to Bill. “Can’t live with me, can’t live without me. Quite a dilemma, huh?”

Bill shakes his head. “Not so bad.” He reaches for Sienna’s hands and gently kisses her fingertips. “At least we never want to kill each other.”

“Well, sometimes I want to kill you, when you toss your jacket over the living room chair, or …”

“
Ssh,
” Bill says, wrapping his arms around her.

“And I want to kill you when you say ‘
Ssh
,’ ” Sienna starts to say, and then she laughs. “Bill, I love you.”

“I love you too, Sienna. I’ve never said that to any other woman.”

“And I’ve never told another man that I want us to spend
our whole lives together. I’ve never been willing to share my heart with anyone.…”

“Or your bathroom,” I note.

“Hmm, the bathroom …” Sienna smiles. “Why don’t we start with my letting Bill leave a dish in the sink every now and then, and see where we go from there.”

Bill gathers Sienna in his arms and pulls her close for a kiss. “Sienna, you’re my, you’re my everything!” Bill says, unable to find a word large or important enough to encompass everything that he’s feeling.

“And you’re my Javan Rhino.” Sienna giggles.

“She’ll explain later,” Peter leans in toward Bill to whisper. “Trust me, it’s a good thing.”

P
ETER ENCIRCLES ME
in his arms. “You really are pretty good at this matchmaking stuff.”

“I am, aren’t I?” I say contentedly, snuggling against Peter. Then excitedly, I turn around. “Don’t think this is crazy, listen to the whole idea … but what if I started a matchmaking business? A real matchmaking business, pairing people together to help them find
love,
” I say, making an important distinction between this new idea and my last venture.

“You know, you really don’t have to work anymore;
BUBB
is starting to pull in the big bucks and …” Peter pauses and shakes his head. “I think that would be a swell idea, honey. And I think you’d be good at it. I even have the perfect name,
Tru Love
! I guess if we can’t open a diner just to call it ‘Tru Grits,’ this is the next best thing.”

“Tru Love,” I say, rolling the words around in my mouth. “It’s destiny! Finally, I understand why the universe allowed Naomi to name me Truman.”

“Are you and Daddy making word plays with your name again?” Molly says, as she and Paige walk over and catch the last part of our conversation. “I thought you were going to come up with a perfume and name it ‘Tru Romance’?”

“That was just a pipe dream.” I laugh. “But I think I can really do this. I can’t give people romance in a bottle. But I can help introduce them to the love of their lives.”

“Oh groan, Mom. Just promise you won’t have a teenage division, okay?” Paige teases.

“I promise.” I laugh. “Besides, your dad and I aren’t planning on letting you date again until you’re thirty-six.”

“How about thirty-two?” Molly smiles.

“We’ll talk.”

“Tru, that could be perfect!” Sienna yelps. And then realizing what she’s said, she backtracks. “I mean it could be very, very good.”

Cher cocks an eyebrow.

“My mom has this thing about not tempting the fates. If you say something’s perfect, it’s sure to go to shit,” Paige explains. “I mean, it will turn bad.”

“Perfect. Very, very good. Ladies, I told you, we make our own luck! I’m living proof!” Cher hoots. “My career’s been up and down more times than Kirstie Alley’s weight. But at the end of the day I’ve sold more than one hundred million records. I’m the oldest artist to have ever had a hit record in the Hot One Hundred. And I’ve never been happier. If you really want something you can figure out how to make it happen. And oops,” Cher says, looking at her watch and blowing us all air kisses. “What I need to make happen right now is not missing my plane.” She loops her arm through Jeff’s. “Tell Naomi I’ll sing at the wedding. Hell, I’ll sing at your wedding, too,” she says, waving toward Sienna. Jeff helps Cher make her way
past her adoring fans and then he finds Naomi. From a few feet away I see him gazing at my mother with that goofy, cockeyed look of a man who wonders how he got so lucky.

“If Naomi’s ever worried about staying young, all she has to do is catch her reflection in Jeff’s eyes,” I say.

Peter smiles and turns my head toward his. “You could say the same. We didn’t meet when we were sixteen, but you were my first love, too,” he murmurs. “Looks like a happy ending.”

“More like a new beginning, for everybody,” I say, leaning into Peter’s body and interlacing my fingers with his. “I’m glad they’re getting a second chance.”

“I’m glad we’re getting a second chance,” Peter says, kissing me, and discreetly moving his lips down my bare shoulder.

A tingle goes through my body, the familiar yet new tingle that pleasures me, comforts me, and still surprises me after all of these years. “Hey, mister, when we get home there’s been something I’ve been meaning to show you,” I say, remembering the musical toy I bought all those weeks ago on my shopping expedition with the girls from the Veronica Agency. “Think you can dig up a recording of The William Tell Overture?”

Across the room, in a corner, Bill and Sienna are can’t take their eyes—or their hands—off each other. Over by the chocolate fountain, Paige is sweet-talking a waiter into giving her extra strawberries and Molly seems to be flirting with a cute boy I’m guessing is somebody’s grandson. There’s another raucous round of hooting and clapping as the Miss Subways take a final bow. Then, just as the band is reaching a last crescendo, I hear the unmistakable crash of thunder.

“Rain is lucky, at least at a wedding,” I say, looking up at Peter. “The last time I tried to convince myself that bad weather was a good omen was the night of the global warming benefit. And we all know how that turned out.”

“Not so badly,” Peter says, wrapping his arms around me.

“If you really want something you can make it happen.” I laugh, repeating Cher’s words, which I’ve vowed to make my new motto. We make our own choices. We chart our own course. We make our own fate. Then, just as Peter’s about to kiss me, I finger the turquoise scarab necklace that Sienna gave me the night of that other, fateful party. Because I’d have to be a complete idiot not to realize that right now, at this very moment, I’m the luckiest girl in the world.

I
’M GRATEFUL TO MY
most intelligent, lovely, and loyal agent, Jane Gelfman, whose encouragement keeps me going. To the smart and savvy Jill Schwartzman, an author couldn’t ask for a better editor—throughout every aspect of publication, Jill helped come up with
The Best Laid Plans
. Caitlin Alexander stepped in, seamlessly, to helm this project with grace, great ideas, and enthusiasm. Many thanks to publisher Libby McGuire and associate publisher Kim Hovey for their endless energy and spirited support. And to the gang at Ballantine who helped turn these pages of words into a book: assistant editor Rebecca Shapiro, cover designer Lynn Andreozzi, interior designer Mary Wirth, production editor Crystal Velasquez, and copy editor Michael D. Aisner. Thank you publicists Katie Rudkin and Lisa Barnes; and Quinn Rogers and Kristin Fassler from the marketing department—it’s thanks to you that readers have found their way to these pages.

Thanks to Eliot Spitzer for inadvertently creating a scandal, which led to a million details about the call-girl business that I was able to garner from daily news stories. Insight and information also came from rereading the witty and wily Sidney Biddle Barrows’s
Mayflower Madam
. Less controversial facts about the world’s most dangerous professions and footwear
came from
The General Book of Ignorance
. Many thanks to my friend, emergency room doctor Pamela Arsove, for information about heart attacks (and her great cakes). To Rosanne Kang for suggestions about the look of the book and for being Rosanne. To that haven, the Writers Room, where most of this book was written. My most beloved niece Lori Edelman’s marriage to the wonderful Dejay Clayton inspired the Hawaiian wedding scene. Dr. Fredric Brandt is a real dermatologist and I count myself lucky to be his patient—as “Dr. B.” in the book he finds himself in a fictional situation, but everything else I say about him is true.

My mother, Marian Edelman (who is nothing like Naomi, the mother of my protagonist), is nevertheless an inspiration. She, my honorary mom Julia Levy, and my “Aunt Marcia” Kirshner, are my biggest cheerleaders.

Friends, too numerous to name, know who they are. I am grateful for their love, support, and patience—thank you, all, for putting up with me.

L
YNN
S
CHNURNBERGER
is the bestselling author or coauthor of five books, including
The Botox Diaries
and
Mine Are Spectacular
! She has written for
New York
magazine,
The New York Times, People, Parade
, and
Reader’s Digest
, among others, and has made regular television appearances, most notably on
The Oprah Winfrey Show, Good Morning America
, and
Entertainment Tonight
. She is also the founder of Foster Pride, a nonprofit that provides art classes and mentoring to New York City foster children.